City health watchdogs have again raised concerns about long waits and lack of privacy at Walsgrave Hospital's under-pressure emergency assessment unit.

They heard how one patient who had taken a suspected overdose waited 2? days to be seen.

Coventry Community Health Council members expressed frustration over the lack of apparent improvement during its regular check on the hospital's admissions centre.

The latest audit, taken by Joan Spencer and Ann Herdman on March 4, revealed the same story of people waiting hours for beds on wards, with the longest total wait being 58 hours and 45 minutes for a 54-year-old who had a suspected overdose.

A 91-year-old with suspected pneumonia waited nearly 37 hours and an 85-year-old with suspected pleurisy had a wait of 36? hours.

There were 51 patients in the unit, which was so busy that CHC members saw a doctor examining a patient on a trolley in a corridor with no screens around them.

After the check the CHC members were told two patients had been in area 2 of the unit - a holding area where people waiting to go up to a ward receive interim treatment and are allocated a bed - for nearly five days.

Rosemarie Tonkinson, chairman of the CHC said: "We do have concerns about these elderly people who have very long waits.

"We are highlighting the same issues month after month."

Hilary Scholefield, director of nursing for University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire NHS Trust, which runs Walsgrave Hospital, said: "We accept what you are saying but it is not that we are ignoring the issues or we are not doing anything."

She said it would be useful to share more details of work which was ongoing, but perhaps was not always visible, with the CHC.

Judith Lewis, head of accident and emergency services for the trust, told the CHC she had been very concerned when informed about the apparent five-day waits in the EAU area 2, as she had not been notified.

She said she had spoken to staff and pulled patient files to investigate and would be taking up the incident with the medical division in a bid to find the truth of the matter.

She added that while it was not ideal for patients to be in this holding area, they were still receiving treatment and doctors could visit them.

Gary Ward, clinical director for A&E services, said he regarded all the staff in the EAU as heroes: "It is a credit to them that they carry on working in that environment without en bloc giving in their notice."

He accepted it was unprofessional to examine patients in corridors but sometimes the unit was so busy it was almost impossible to move trolleys around for doctors to get at.